Specifically in metal riffs, of course 
But man, I gotta say, I got sick of the "whole play a riff, then play it again...harmonized!" thing a LONG time ago, it generally sounds horribly cliche to me now. No, counterpoint is really what gets me, having one riff/lick that's different but still related to another, putting 'em together, and reveling in the way your attention seems to be divided between the two but yet they seem to unify as one. Dream Theater do this a lot, especially when the keyboard will be playing a melody, and Petrucci will be riffing away awesomely underneath (an example would be at 2:42 in "About to Crash: Reprise", AKA Part VI of Six Degrees Disc 2 - and I tried to find a video of it, but I couldn't deal with the 3 pages of bedroom cover versions 
)
Another example I love is the main riff (at 0:35) in Kamelot's "III Ways to Epica" - yes, it's a little cheesy, but listen to how awesome the underlying riff is under that soaring lead
(and unfortunately the only vid I could find with decent audio quality was this guy's photo album )
I'm usually not a fan of power metal, but man are these guys an exception!
And finally, what got me thinking of this was both that TesseracT clip in the main section of the forum and the fact that I've recently discovered another bit of amazing counterpoint that has taken its rank among my all-time favorites: 3:15 in Opeth's "Serenity Painted Death"
Share some of your favorite examples, but I would ask that they really be cool/interesting counterpoint in the metal vein like the three above, which all have a pretty consistent similarity I think. But hey, threads do take on lives of their own, after all, so nah, have at it
But man, I gotta say, I got sick of the "whole play a riff, then play it again...harmonized!" thing a LONG time ago, it generally sounds horribly cliche to me now. No, counterpoint is really what gets me, having one riff/lick that's different but still related to another, putting 'em together, and reveling in the way your attention seems to be divided between the two but yet they seem to unify as one. Dream Theater do this a lot, especially when the keyboard will be playing a melody, and Petrucci will be riffing away awesomely underneath (an example would be at 2:42 in "About to Crash: Reprise", AKA Part VI of Six Degrees Disc 2 - and I tried to find a video of it, but I couldn't deal with the 3 pages of bedroom cover versions )Another example I love is the main riff (at 0:35) in Kamelot's "III Ways to Epica" - yes, it's a little cheesy, but listen to how awesome the underlying riff is under that soaring lead
(and unfortunately the only vid I could find with decent audio quality was this guy's photo album )I'm usually not a fan of power metal, but man are these guys an exception!
And finally, what got me thinking of this was both that TesseracT clip in the main section of the forum and the fact that I've recently discovered another bit of amazing counterpoint that has taken its rank among my all-time favorites: 3:15 in Opeth's "Serenity Painted Death"
Share some of your favorite examples, but I would ask that they really be cool/interesting counterpoint in the metal vein like the three above, which all have a pretty consistent similarity I think. But hey, threads do take on lives of their own, after all, so nah, have at it
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